(yogic) Dissonance

(yogic) Dissonance

last weekend in our classes together we talked about true power and strength (as not being necessarily the same thing, but sourced from the same ground of introspection, reflection, and balanced and stable action), and over the course of the week there has been quite a lot of varying displays of Power and Strength on the global stage…lots of conversations being had about who is responsible for what, and how much.

“this moment has teased out the question of how we use our power and what we lend our power to”-Chani Nicholas

much of the time i feel that there is a dissonance in how we consider yoga philosophy in the greater context of being alive in our globalized world. the keystone of the yoga practice is ahimsa, but how do we actually practice non-harming? patanjali tells us early in the sutra-s that we arent inherently separate from anything, but are we not complicit in the normalization of so much ‘othering’?

even my own use of ‘we’ is questionable…

from my understanding of the human body, everything within exists in relationship–there is so much connective tissue that holds everything together that it seems only for convenience in the way we consider anatomy that we take things apart in order to name and examine them. it seems as well unlikely that any isolated part knows itself by name, and that should it know itself thusly, that it would find that awareness to be useful in the context of being separate.

so why, when the warp and weft of ALL THINGS is so densely intwerwoven do we pick at strands and make ‘others’ of anyone? unlike the way we do so to better understand our anatomy, when we ‘otherize’ any collection of people, based on anything, we do so in a way that cuts off understanding…even the potential for understanding.

in her record New Amerykah part II, erykah badu says that there are only two frequencies: fear and love.

when i first heard that track i struggled with the simplicity of it, shouldnt things be more complicated than that?

find a comfortable seat with your hips slightly higher than your knees (sit on a blanket or pillow, or if theres tenderness in your low back, feel free to lay down)…feel into where you meet the earth and how you receive it; feel into where you meet space and how you receive it; feel into where you meet the world and how you receive it–how you become it, how you give yourself to it over and over without question.